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Give What You Have Been Given

The Rev. Thomas W. Simmons IV

Last week I preached about Christian community and what a grand thing it is.  I closed the sermon with a challenge.  "Let's see what we can do to nurture and protect and deepen our Christian community here at St. Peter’s and see what Jesus does in our midst.” Then I said, “I look forward to seeing that."

Well, it turned out I didn't have long to wait.  That night at my Installation, and the whole week before, I witnessed Christian community like I think I've never seen it before.   It was evident in the many, many people that came together to make it all happen.  There were so many people doing so many things so well with such joy and devotion and creativity.  The result was a magnificent event. 

This showed me that we have all the makings of a great Christian community here. And whenever I thought of it this week I just had to smile.  I’m so grateful for the privilege of serving here at this time when so much seems to be happening.  Jesus said "I will be in the midst of them" and I can tangibly sense his presence. 

What we need to do now is continue doing what we did last week.  We need to figure out what worked so well and apply it to everything else we do.  I think the leadership, teamwork, unity of purpose, creativity, wide participation and generous sharing of time, talent and treasure are the secrets of our future success. 

Our Scripture texts today remind us of one other secret to a thriving church, and that’s tending to our relationships in the Body of Christ.  Sirach, Paul and Jesus teach us how to deal with the inevitable friction that exists between people.

Last week Jesus taught us what to do when "another member of the church sins against you."  Instead of retaliating, or withdrawing or becoming a victim or brushing it off, Jesus tells us to take the risk of humbly confronting the person we feel has wronged us. 

"Go and point out the fault."  If the person ignores us and refuses to apologize and reconcile, Jesus urges us to try two more times.  If those attempts fail Jesus instructs us to expel that person from Christian community.  

It’s interesting to me that excommunication has most commonly been used against heresy and notorious immorality.  But here excommunication is used against relational sin. Jesus will not allow un-repentance and unwillingness to reconcile to fester like a cancer in the Body of Christ. Surgery is needed to remove it. 

Well, this gets the disciples thinking and in typical fashion, Peter speaks first.  He wants to know what exactly Jesus is talking about.  Jesus says that the victim of obnoxious behavior in the church has a responsibility to seek out, confront and forgive the offender, but Peter wants to know where the boundaries are.

Assuming the offender repents, “How often should I forgive?” Peter asks, “seven times?"  That’s a lot of forgiving. Just imagine someone in the church doing something insulting, offensive or hurtful to you on seven different occasions.  That's every Sunday for nearly two months - definitely above and beyond the call of duty, right?

Peter thinks so.  Based on rabbinic teaching, three times was the prescribed mandatory maximum number of offenses to be forgiven.  It was sort of a three-strikes-you're-out rule.  So Peter is generous and more than doubles this number.  But Jesus has an entirely different order of magnitude in mind. 

“Not seven times, but, I tell you, seventy seven times." That’s every Sunday for a year and a half.  But it gets worse.  Jesus’ words are more often translated, “seventy TIMES seven,” which equals 490 times to forgive.  That’s ten years worth!  I just don’t know if I have that much forgiveness in me.  Do you? 

Jesus shows us how with a little story about debt.   There's a guy who owes the king 10,000 talents.  A "talent" was a very large sum of money.  It was so large in fact that in a single year Israel’s tax bill to Rome amounted to 600 talents. Our guy owes ten THOUSAND talents. This is a national-sized debt. 

Some of you, I’m sure, know the anxiety of huge debt.  Imagine having that sum hanging over your head.  Well the king calls in the debt.  Our guy begs for just a little more time and promises to repay "everything.”  I can’t imagine how sincere he is, but hey worth a try, right?   What else does he have to lose? 

The king ignores the man’s request for a little time and instead shocks everyone by completely forgiving the debt - clean slate, Chapter 11, no questions asked. 

What’s Jesus saying here? He’s describing our relationship with God.  We all have this impossibly outrageous, national-sized debt we owe him and we can never repay.  In times of trouble people make all kinds of silly promises to God, but they aren’t enough. God cuts through the crap and simply forgives us in Christ.  He cleans the slate and starts us anew.  “As far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our sins from us,” is how the Psalmist put it. 

Jesus is saying that when it comes to people in the church who sin against us, we should do likewise.  He wants us to forgive others as much as we have been forgiven.  Those 10,000 talents are the stupendous extent of our debt – and of God’s forgiveness – and of the forgiveness we owe each other here at St. Peter’s. 

But what happens?  Our guy, with his new lease on life, starts planning for the future he didn't think he had.  So he starts calling in his debts.  He finds some poor sod who owes him 100 denarii and grabs him by the throat and demands the money without mercy.  For a sense of scale, a denarius was a day's wage, not even pennies on the dollar to what our guy owned the king. 

Our guy has a problem doesn’t he?  Jesus makes it so clear!  We have the same problem when we refuse to forgive someone in the body of Christ.  When word gets back to the king our guy is in big trouble.  The king treats him the same way he treated others.  “He handed him over to be tortured.”  

Jesus gives us two very simple principles here.  The first is, “Give what you have been given.”  You have been forgiven much so you should forgive much. God calls each of us to relinquish our anger and desire for revenge, to relinquish even our rights that we might give others the forgiveness God has given us. 

The second is like unto it: “What you give you will receive.”  This is a promise of accountability in our relationships.  Our Old Testament passage talks about this.  “The vengeful will face the Lord’s vengeance for he keeps a strict account of their sins.” And Paul says, “Why do you despise your brother or sister?  For we will all stand before the judgment seat of God.”

How you treat others in this church will thus impact your life for eternity.  All of us will be held accountable for the quality of our love and care and forgiveness and willingness to reconcile with each other right here at St Peter’s. 

And it isn’t easy.  There are plenty of odd and difficult people in the church – and you know who you are.  Relationships can be difficult. There’s an old joke in which one priest says to another, “I just love the church, isn’t it grand?”  To which the other replies, “Yeah, it would be if it weren’t for all these people!” 

Every church has it’s history.  I’ve heard a little about the history of conflict here at St Peter’s and I know that people have left here in anger and it has hurt this community. But that’s the past.  As we look to the future, I know we’ll do better next time.  Let’s agree to that, OK?

Conflict is normal.  Anytime you get a bunch of people together in close community there’s going to be friction and sparks are going to fly. 

And that’s exactly where Jesus’ principles of community apply the most. Because if we can love and forgive and reconcile with each other when the sparks are flying then we are experiencing the transforming power of the Gospel and have achieved true Christian community.  That’s where heaven and earth meet and Jesus’ presence is manifested.

It begins in your own heart with your sense of joy and freedom at being forgiven.  It emanates outward in your desire to give that same gift to the person next to you. “The peace of the Lord be with you.”

As we struggle to forgive and reconcile, here’s a prayer for us. It’s our collect this morning: “O God, because without you I am not able to please you mercifully grant that your Holy Spirit may in all things direct and rule my heart.”  AMEN